More than 2,300 displaced people in Al-Lait Jar al-Nabi, North Darfur, are facing worsening food shortages, disease and a lack of humanitarian assistance, a local displacement group said on Tuesday.

Adam Rijal, spokesperson for the General Coordination for Displaced Persons and Refugees, said 571 families, 2,325 people, were living in deteriorating conditions. The group said the population included 941 children under 15, with 26 cases of acute malnutrition recorded among children, along with 133 pregnant and breastfeeding women in need of healthcare and around 200 cases of malaria.

Failed harvests deepen the crisis

Rijal said poor rainfall and climatic shocks had damaged the agricultural season in an area where families depend heavily on millet and groundnut cultivation for food and income. The group said the absence of humanitarian assistance had compounded the crisis and warned that conditions could deteriorate further without urgent intervention.

The situation in Al-Lait reflects wider food insecurity across Darfur, where conflict, displacement, falling agricultural production and restricted humanitarian access have increased hunger and malnutrition. An October alert by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification warned of an increasing risk of famine in parts of Darfur and Kordofan if conflict intensifies and humanitarian access deteriorates.

The same alert reported poor crop growth across nearly two-thirds of farmland in North Darfur, and acute malnutrition above famine thresholds in two displacement camps in South Darfur. Earlier analysis estimated that about 19.5 million people across Sudan were facing acute food insecurity, including more than five million at emergency levels.

The General Coordination called on United Nations agencies and humanitarian organisations to provide food, medicine, shelter and primary healthcare in Al-Lait Jar al-Nabi urgently, with priority given to children and pregnant and breastfeeding women. The figures reported by the group could not be independently verified, Sudan Now reported.